


All Eyes

by RoseByAnyOtherName17



Series: The Lion, the Wolf and the Dragon [34]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Castle Black, F/M, Love, North, Singing, Strategy & Tactics, White Walkers, Wights, talk of marriage, the wall - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-03
Updated: 2019-08-03
Packaged: 2020-07-30 13:30:18
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,456
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20097982
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RoseByAnyOtherName17/pseuds/RoseByAnyOtherName17
Summary: It was time to go to the Wall.





	All Eyes

**Author's Note:**

> Next part :) I believe we may be drawing to a close soon folks (which with the speed I write, we'll be lucky if that's by December :P) 
> 
> Enjoy!

Any wedding would have to wait, because it was time to make their move onto the Wall.

A raven from Edd Tollett came the morning after Sansa showed Arya the unfinished wedding dress; the army of the dead was amassing at Craster’s Keep, and the first White Walker had been spotted just a couple of leagues from Castle Black. A ranger had been killed in the brief scuffle before the rest of the men could escape.

“They’re converging on Castle Black,” Jon announced. “We need to go.”

Sansa, Bran, Lady Stoneheart, Lyanna Mormont, and Robin Arryn would remain at Winterfell with a small army in the event that the dead broke through the Wall’s defenses. The majority of the Night’s Watch and Vale men would move to Castle Black, but the remainder of the castles would keep a small force as well; Jon doubted that the Night King would leave them be. Ravens were dispatched to Daenerys and the other major houses telling them the news, and asking to send what men they could. Arya had made contact with so many of them that she was confident the request would be well met, but they had no time to wait for them to make it to Winterfell.

An idea was forming in her mind, something mad, something that Jon and Gendry would not allow unless there was nothing else to do, and so she kept it to herself and to Bran. “Can you see what might happen to us?” she asked him quietly that evening.

But Bran shook his head. “I can only see the past, and the present if I’m near the Weirwood tree,” he admitted. “I can’t tell what our future is to be.” He held her gaze seriously. “But for what it’s worth, it’s a good plan. Whatever happens, lives will be lost, and risks will be taken. There’s nothing else for it.”

She made love to Gendry that night, cradling his face in her hands as they moved together, climaxing with him inside her and her lips pressed to his forehead. His eyes burned in the low light of the fire, looking up at her with completely unbridled and unhidden love. For the first time, she pulled him over on top of her after, running her fingers through his hair as he slowly, carefully settled his full weight on her body in increments. There was no panic, no fear of being pinned down. Given time, Arya thought, they might be able to make love like this, her gazing up at him instead of the other way around.

Gods, she hoped they had time.

**

Robin Arryn hardly ever left his chambers, sickly as he was, but he appeared to wish them good fortune on their journey somewhat clumsily, sneaking uncertain glances at Sansa with every other word. Looking at him, Arya was selfishly glad that Jon had not allowed her to put forth a betrothal to secure his loyalty. Even if Gendry had never returned to her, she would not enjoy being tied down to such a man, one she would have to wait hand and foot on for the rest of her life just to ensure his own endured.

Lady Stoneheart said nothing, but she put a loose strand of hair behind Arya’s ear and took her hand in thin fingers. With rough lips, she kissed Arya’s hand, and after some hesitation, she pressed another to the top of her head. For a split second, Arya could imagine that it was Catelyn Stark and not her shadow, if she closed her eyes.

They were surrounded by lords, by men, but Arya still flung herself into Bran’s arms, causing his chair to roll back a few inches before Podrick Payne caught it. After believing for so long that he was dead, and knowing full well that she might be walking into the arms of death herself, it was difficult to let go. “Be here when I get back,” she whispered.

Bran smiled at her when she pulled away, grasping her hands as she steadied herself on her feet. “Where else would I go?”

“To some weirwood tree north of the Wall, if given the chance,” Arya joked, or tried to.

“It won’t be me lugging his chair through all that snow again,” Meera Reed said with a smirk and wink. She made it easier, somehow, for Arya to turn away; there was no doubt in her mind that Meera loved her brother, and would continue to care for him.

She embraced Sansa last, hoping against hope that it wasn’t the last time. “When you return, your dress will be finished,” Sansa murmured in her ear. “Just in case.”

Arya squeezed her hard. “I’ll let you do my hair too, if you want.”

When Sansa laughed, it sounded choked, but there were no tears in her eyes when she let Arya go. “I’m holding you to that,” she said, and added in a lower voice, “I know you love him, but Gendry is awful at braiding your hair.”

“He’s better than he was,” Arya pointed out. Sansa’s smile faltered, and Arya found herself in her sister’s arms once more, face pressed to the fur lining of Sansa’s neckline. She breathed in her sister’s flowery perfume, the same she had worn since they were children, and let it out slowly. When they let go, Arya stepped away and mounted her horse.

“Gendry,” Sansa called after the man, who was about to follow Arya’s lead. He turned back warily and bowed his head, but Sansa shook her own and wrapped her arms around him, much to his obvious surprise. Arya smiled a little when Gendry didn’t know where to put his hands, and when Sansa whispered something, his ears went red. He turned to his horse the second he was released, and when Arya raised an eyebrow, Sansa only winked back. Gendry pointedly refused to look at either of them.

At that moment, Viserion let out a shriek and took to the skies. Ten minutes later, the gates of Winterfell closed, and the army was headed north on the Kingsroad.

**

Jon had been able to pretend that Arya did not have Gendry sleeping in her bed when his chambers were on the other side of the castle, and so his demeanor with Gendry was friendly. They were both bastards of two of the most important men in Westeros, and bonded over their mutual, though very different, love for Arya.

However, he couldn’t possibly miss the two of them crawling into the same tent together the first night away from Winterfell, being that his own was but a few feet away. His jaw was tightly clenched the next morning over a quick breakfast before they set off again, bad mood unconsciously affecting Ghost. The direwolf snapped at Nymeria when she tried to have their usual romp. The only reason they did not break out into a fight was Viserion stepping in on Ghost’s side, hissing at Nymeria. The she-wolf backed down begrudgingly, but clung unusually close to Gendry for the whole day of riding. To Arya, at least, a point was obviously being made. Jon’s temperament did not improve come night again.

By the third day, tensions were high enough that Gendry told Arya quietly that it might be best if he were to sleep elsewhere. She told him that he was being as stupid as Jon, and pulled her brother aside as the army was setting up camp. “You have to stop this,” she said firmly. “Gendry is a good man, he loves me more than anything, and I love him too. We’ve been sharing the same space ever since I destroyed House Frey and that will not stop just because _you _are being an overprotective arse. If we survive the next few moons, I will wear the dress Sansa is making for me and wed him in the godswood in Winterfell.” Jon’s eyes widened in shock, but she wasn’t finished. “_You_ said that if I found love, it was to be _my _choice. This is it, Jon. Gendry is my choice.”

Jon swallowed hard. “You would marry him?”

Arya nodded without hesitation.

Jon was not as friendly with Gendry as he had been before, but there was a clear effort being made after that, which Arya was secretly relieved for. Though the army rode hard on the Kingsroad, there was still conversation to be had. On the tenth day, a familiar tune played some ways behind them, carried forward by the wind. Arya glanced at Gendry to see the same expression of confusion on his face that she was sure was on her own, and wordlessly they both turned their horses around and followed the sound through the crowd of men and Wildling women until they came upon a few men of the Brotherhood Without Banners. Most had stayed behind with Lady Stoneheart, but Thoros of Myr insisted on accompanying them to the Wall. With him came a few more familiar faces, men Arya had not talked with since returning to Winterfell, in part because of the way they had parted before.

The singer was Tom Sevenstrings, the one who had always looked at Gendry and Arya with a strange sadness when they were children. There was no melancholy in his expression now, only warmth as he sang, and the melody hit Arya like a punch in the chest.

_“My featherbed is deep and soft,_  
_ and there I’ll lay you down,_  
_ I’ll dress you all in yellow silk_  
_ and on your head a crown._  
_ For you shall be my lady love,_  
_ and I shall be your lord._  
_ I’ll always keep you warm and safe,_  
_ and guard you with my sword._  
  
_ And how she smiled and how she laughed, the maiden of the tree._  
_ She spun away and said to him, _  
_ no featherbed for me._  
_ I’ll wear a gown of golden leaves,_  
_ and bind my hair with grass,_  
_ But you can be my forest love,_  
_ and me your forest lass.”_

The last time she heard that song, she was wearing a torn dress covered in dirt, standing next to an equally sullied Gendry, in the hall of a lady’s castle whose name she could not remember. She was still a child pretending to be a woman grown, lying to herself and everyone around her, insisting that she needed nothing and no one but her family. She hadn’t known by then that Gendry was her family too; she’d realized it too late, when he was already lost.

“I had thought you dead,” she said bluntly to Tom. “You weren’t with Lady Stoneheart when we met her in the Riverlands.”

“I was elsewhere, fighting other criminals,” Tom explained. “When I heard you two were together again though…well.” He nodded towards Gendry. “That one never stopped looking for you. I suppose it was for the best.”

“It was,” Arya agreed.

“I suppose you proved us all wrong,” he continued. “You aren’t much of a lady at all.”

“Perhaps you need to rethink your definition of a lady,” Arya said loftily, turning to wink swiftly at Gendry as the men roared with laughter. She tugged on the reins of her horse and trotted back to the head of the army, Tom singing the song once more behind her. Cold as it was, a nugget of warmth settled in her chest, growing when Gendry caught up and smiled at her.

**

She had seen portraits of the Wall in books, but they did not prepare her for the way the temperature dropped as they came upon it, nor the way it gleamed dully against the grey sky, clouds filled with unfallen snow. The sheer height of it made her neck hurt, trying to see the top, so she focused instead on the man that came out to greet Jon. They embraced roughly, clapping each other on the back, and introductions were made.

Edd Tollett wasn’t quite what she’d imagined, though when she thought about it, she wasn’t quite sure _what _she’d imagined. His eyes were terribly sad, and while he held himself up tall, shoulders back, he seemed unbelievably small, though he was of a height with Jon. Privately, she thought that leadership did not much agree with him the way it did with Jon; the man seemed old beyond his years and somewhat defeated.

Even so, he spoke with authority he had evidently learned, and his words were firm. “We’ve received ravens from Mace Tyrell and Edmure Tully,” he told Jon. “They are each sending two hundred men; in the event that they do not arrive before battle, they will stay to help with what repairs they can.” Assuming there would be repairs to be made, and that the army of the dead did not destroy them all and storm Westeros. As always, that went unsaid. “We’ve nothing else yet; you’re certain Daenerys Targaryen will send help?”

“The Unsullied with us are a promise,” Arya said. “She will keep her word.”

When Viserion landed just outside the gates with a snow-muffled thump and a shriek, Edd Tollett didn’t seem the least bit surprised. “Of _course _you would end up with a dragon,” he muttered. Jon grinned and nudged him in the side, dodging the punch sent to his arm.

Castle Black wasn’t very impressive, she thought, and hardly had room for visitors, let alone an army of almost seven thousand men, and more coming to boot. “Mole Town is not far, and mostly empty,” Edd said, when Arya commented on the lack of space. “There are Wildlings living there, but a thousand men can probably squeeze in. Rotations could be made.”

“How far is not far?” Gendry asked.

“Half a day’s ride,” Jon answered. “Shorter, if the horse is fast.”

Their meal that night was modest, but good. The ale, however, was truly terrible. Arya asked Jon if he was sure it was being stabbed that killed him, and not the swill they were drinking. Several of the men around them fell silent, but Tormund Giantsbane roared with thunderous laughter, and Jon couldn’t quite smother a grin.

Arya was offered a room of her own, quite cramped compared to her chambers at Winterfell and the castles she had been staying in for the past several moons, but she was grateful for it all the same. She wasted no time in fitting Gendry in the bed with her, narrow as it was. When she caught Jon’s eye on their way to the room, he only sighed and mouthed the word _subtle_, to which she grinned.

Tomorrow, she would put her plan into motion – ask to accompany the rangers on their ride north of the Wall, and attempt to capture a Wight.


End file.
